Silicon Valley donations to Obama reach record levels

And Romney's making small in-roads into the traditionally Democratic area.

Last week, President Barack Obama swung through Silicon Valley, taking in nearly $13 million for his re-election campaign and the Democratic National Committee, according to Politico. That’s more than at the same point four years ago, when he brought in $9.1 million. However, the political site points out, while there’s more money coming in, it’s coming in from fewer sources.

"A Politico analysis of federal campaign finance reports shows that the president received 12,000 contributions of $200 or more from Silicon Valley through this point in 2008 but only 6,400 so far in this election cycle," the site reported.

“A small set of e-elites, 36 in all, had given the president $35,800 maximum checks through the end of March. The group includes familiar names such as Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Google Chairman Eric Schmidt, who is one of four executives from his company to max out to Obama."

Not surprisingly, the Valley largely swings to the left, but Mitt Romney has attracted some tech superstars, like Marc Andreesen, the venture capitalist and founder of Netscape, who has given the Republican challenger $100,000 this year—Andreesen was an Obama supporter in 2008. According to Politico, Romney has only taken in $1.76 million so far from the California tech community.

A quick dip into OpenSecrets.org, an online tool from the Center for Responsive Politics, shows that so far, the majority of employees from the rank-and-file of major Bay Area tech companies also go for Obama too.

Even venture capitalists are getting behind the Illinois Democrat: employees of the venture capital giant Kleiner Perkins gave $7,500 to Obama and $3,500 to Romney. However, Tim Draper, of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, another Sand Hill Road bigwig, first gave a total of $5,000 to Obama in September, but records show he had also previously given $2,500 to Romney in July.